Ward Outboxes Kovalev in Vegas

Ward Outboxes Kovalev - Last night at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada Andre Ward went to 31-0 after he won a narrow UD over Sergey Kovalev by identical scores of 114-113. The win transferred the WBA, EBO and IBF world titles at 175 pounds to Ward, giving him world titles in two weight classes to date.

The champion Kovalev entered the fight a slight underdog, but in the early goingKovalev was looking like the bigger and stronger man. He sent Ward to the canvas in round two to score a 10-8 round. Ward had dug himself a points hole early, but he stood up and took Kovalev's firepower into the middle rounds. It was there that the Russian seemed to lose something in his power and precision and Ward was able to operate with a lot less to worry about. Kovalev did not back away and he was constantly firing so the ebbs and flows of the match seemed to change in every round multiple times.

In the end it was Ward's gritty infighting that swayed the judges and allowed him to make up the defecit in the second half of the fight. The controversy will be thick in the aftermath of the fight.

This fight is as good a fight as any to make the argument for 15 round title fights. It is very possible a definit9ve finish would have ensued with three more championship rounds. The way it ended, some will think Ward did enough and others will be just as adamant that he did not.

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Ward Outboxes Kovalev
Prior to the fight, Kovalev could be heard pleading with referee Robert Byrd to call Ward for his rough house tactics, and afterward's Byrd's hands off treatment of the infighting here was called into doubt by Kovalev and his promoter Kathy Duva. Kovalev called for an immediate rematch and it is believed that as the defending champion heading into the fight, that he had that clause built in. So we are going to get a second version of this fight likely in the first half of 2017.